The birds, they sang at break of day
by JeannieMac
Summary: Episode tag: 'ware SPOILERS for "Grow", the season 5 premiere. B/A in the early stages of an established relationship.


**The birds they sang at break of day**  
By Jeannie

Rating: PG-13  
Summary: episode tag ('ware SPOILERS) for "Grow", the season 5 premiere. B/A in the early stages of an established relationship.

Author's Note: I actually wrote this more than a year ago, and posted it on LJ...and entirely forgot to bring it over here. Better late than never, I hope...?

_Disclaimer: these characters are not mine, and no money is being made._

*******

Goren is sitting out on his partner's tiny balcony, in the ratty armchair that she keeps out there along with a few pots of geraniums and some old exercise weights. He's not sure how long it's been since he woke out of a fitful doze and couldn't get back to sleep. He guesses it must be coming up to four thirty or five in the morning. It's still dark and Alex's street is silent, but the birds have started chattering in the tree across the way, and he knows that soon the sky showing through the buildings to the east will be tinged with lighter blue, the first sign of morning.

The sliding door behind him scrapes open, and Alex steps through, wrapped in a blanket and squinty-eyed from sleep.

"Hey," she says, her voice raspy. She picks her way carefully over and settles on the footstool in front of him. She looks pale in the almost-dark, and he can't read her expression.

"Hi. Sorry, I was trying not to disturb you."

She shrugs, yawning. "You didn't. I just woke up. Are you okay?"

"Yeah. Just…you know. Thinking."

"What's on your mind?" she asks carefully. He looks at her, and doesn't have to answer. He knows she knows.

She pushes her breath out in a frustrated hiss.

"I _hate_ that she gets to you like this," she says, staring balefully at the nearest flower pot as though it has suddenly sprouted blonde hair, a South African accent and a daddy complex.

He feels his mouth twitch in a small smile, sudden and uncontrollable; her ferocity on his behalf humbles and thrills him all at once. He gazes at her, cataloguing her.

"She didn't get to me as badly this time round," he finally says, realizing as the words are spoken just how true that is.

Alex narrows her eyes at him, and he can tell she's not quite buying it. "What changed?"

"This," he says simply, gesturing between them. "Us."

She wasn't expecting that, he realizes, watching her hair fall in front of her face as she looks away. It's incredible to him: how can she not know how different everything is for him, now that she's in his life in this new way? But it fits, he guesses; embarrassed deflection is her standard reaction to almost anything resembling a direct compliment. It fills him with a crazy desire to keep talking, just let the words spill out until there's no possible way she can doubt her worth in his eyes. But he keeps his mouth shut and just looks at her, his heart twisting with tenderness.

Alex lifts her chin. "Good," she says, shy and defiant and glad.

She holds his gaze, and he's so distracted by her slow smile that he almost doesn't hear her next question.

"So…why are you sitting out here alone in the dark?"

He lets out a breath. "I don't know. I guess – I'm trying to figure it out. Nicole...why she did the right thing, this time."

"I have a theory about that," Alex offers. He looks the question at her.

"It was you," she says, as though it should be obvious. "You convinced her."

"No," he says immediately. "I just – talked. She's never listened to me before…"

"I know. And I don't know why this time was different. But it was you," Alex repeats. "You got through to her."

It makes him twitch, the thought that he might actually have managed to forge some sort of real connection with Nicole notices, the way she always does.

"Why does that bug you? It's what you do – get inside the perp's head. It saved that little girl."

He lifts his shoulders in a small, tired shrug. "I know. But with her...it's different."

He feels rather than sees Alex tense up; he knows she hates any reminder of how obsessed he has been with Wallace in the past. He badly wants to reassure her, so he tries to explain.

"She's...tried to claim some sort of...relationship...with me ever since we met," he says slowly, feeling his way. "Some sort of twisted common ground." He looks out at the darkened street, breathes, takes the next step. It's harder than he thought it would be to say it out loud. "And I guess...the fact that she listened to me this time...lends c-credence to her claim."

"In _her_ mind, maybe," Alex mutters grumpily. "Not in anything approaching reality."

Her automatic, unqualified conviction loosens something inside him, and he lets out a breath that's almost a laugh. He reaches out a hand, pushing tousled hair behind her ear and tracing her jaw with his thumb.

"I'm okay, really. You should go back to bed, get a couple more hours of sleep before work."

She leans into his touch, looking at him with heavy-lidded eyes. Then she gets up, and he thinks she's actually taking his suggestion, but to his surprise she pushes him gently back into the chair and lowers herself into his lap.

"Nah," she says, looping her arms around his neck, smiling that contented smile at him again. "We haven't had a lot of time to ourselves, lately."

"That's true." In a way it's ridiculous, because they've been spending nothing _but_ time together, putting in twelve hour days at work…but he knows that's not what she means.

"So, unless you'd rather be alone…" she continues. He tightens his arms around her under the blanket.

"No, stay," he breathes.

She lets her head fall forward till their foreheads are touching, and then she's kissing him, slow and deliberate and warm. He feels, as he always does, both dizzy and more strongly _present_ in his body than at any other time. He holds her close, thinking with a distant pang that he can _feel_ how tired she is. But she leans into him with a small sound, her mouth opening to his, and he strokes his hands up her sides and down her back, tracing her vertebrae, the curve of her hips and the lines of her shoulders. She shivers and relaxes under his touch. It's a conversation without words, and she's right – it's been too long since they've had the time, the clear uninterrupted space just to be together like this.

The streetlights go out, and the birds chatter more loudly as the sky turns rich royal blue in the east. They kiss and touch, and talk in short, soft bursts about inconsequential things, and eventually Alex turns her face into the crook of his neck and dozes for awhile. He leans his head back, profoundly grateful for the warm weight of her in his arms, and watches the sun rise, silhouetting the buildings in gold.

END

**Author's note: the title is from Leonard Cohen's song "Anthem":**

_**The birds they sang at break of day**_  
_**Start again, I heard them say...**_


End file.
